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Code Lyoko Intellectual Property Rights History And Status
Due to the merger of Antefilms and France Animation, Moonscoop's bankruptcy, complexity regarding franchising and international broadcasting, and French intellectual property laws; the history and status of the intellectual property rights of the Code Lyoko franchise is an extremely complicated topic. This page is an attempt to map it out. Legal Disclaimer This article is not meant to be legal advice for legal matters in France or any other country; nor is it meant to be legal advice regarding intellectual property. If you require advice regarding intellectual property laws, consult a lawyer of the correct jurisdiction and specialty. French Intellectual Property Law Code Lyoko was originally created in France. Under French law, audiovisual media is considered collaborative work, meaning a work that has been created by multiple authors. The authorship is granted to natural persons (co-authors) that have created the relevant work: scriptwriter, author of the musical composition etc. French law recognizes two types of IP rights: moral rights and proprietary rights. French law states that the relation between authors and producers is such that their relations shall be formalized in a contract in which the author assigns his proprietary rights to the producer. When property and moral rights conflict, it's usually settled via court. Moral Rights Because of this, all of Code Lyoko's original creators, outside of licensing, hold the original moral rights to the components of the franchise they worked on. The moral rights are outlined in French laws. The moral rights include but are not limited to rights to the integrity of the work, the right to withdraw it from circulation, the right of publication control, the right of attribution, and the right to transfer the moral rights to others upon death. They may not surrender them by legal agreement or sell them. Proprietary Rights Proprietary rights are more like traditional copyright laws internationally. The author may transfer his or her proprietary rights to a third party. The general rule is that the proprietary rights of an author last for 70 years after the final calendar date of the year of their death. In cases where the person died in active service, it's 100 years. Posthumous works are copyrighted 25 years from the year of publication. French Non-rights Under French copyright laws, the author can't prevent family showings of the art, personal copies (with some exceptions), lawful database access, parody, pastiche, or caricatures. When proper citation is present, the author can also not prevent cataloge entries, reviews, or diffusion of public speeches as news. History Of Code Lyoko Intellectual Property Transference Thomas Romain and Tania Palumbo originally cocreated Les enfants at Gobelins, including the associated character models. They were hired by Christophe Di Sabatino and Benoît Di Sabatino to create Garage Kids for Antefilms. Thomas Romain and Tania Palumbo cocreated the show's graphic bible. They also cocreated the literary bible with Carlo de Boutiny. Sometime between 2001 and 2003, the first round of licensing began. France Televisions and Canal J were the first licencors. Sometime between then and 2004, Cartoon Network also licensed the show. When Antefilms acquired France Animation, they merged to create Moonscoop. All of the intellectual property of the two companies transferred to the resulting merged company. After the merger, Cartoon Network began being influential on the show, due to the lucrative license. When Moonscoop went bankrupt, things got complicated. Mediatoon's parent company attempted to acquire Moonscoop France's intellectual property. However, because of a quirk in French law, there was a delay in this in which the show's original creators were given the opportunity to acquire the rights themselves. Somehow, Mediatoon ended up owning the proprietary rights of Code Lyoko, but not Code Lyoko Evolution. Additionally, while the legal rights were transferred, source files weren't in all cases; resulting in a BBC-style situation where Mediatoon owned the intellectual property rights to things they didn't have any actual copies of. Current Rights Moral Rights Of Code Lyoko * The moral rights of each Code Lyoko episode, each Code Lyoko prototype and side animation, and each Code Lyoko Evolution episode are owned by their respective writers, storyboarders, animators, and other creators. * The original literary and graphical bibles are morally owned by their respective creators, as stated in the history section. * Code Lyoko Evolution's literary bible's moral rights are owned by Sophie Decroisette. Current Status Of Code Lyoko French Proprietary Rights * France Télévisions and the Lagardère Group (the owners of Canal J) seem to have exclusive broadcasting rights in France for Code Lyoko and Code Lyoko Evolution. * Aside from cases where media was purchased before the transfer, like on Amazon or iTunes, Mediatoon seems to hold the exclusive digital distribution rights for Code Lyoko, and is using Youtube to distribute it. Known Rights Outside Of France * Kabillion seems to exclusively hold the US broadcasting rights. * Rai Gulp holds the rights to broadcast Code Lyoko and Code Lyoko Evolution over the air and digitally in the Italian language for the Italian market * Bandai previously held the proprietary rights to manufacture and sell Code Lyoko toys. These rights have expired. Unknown Rights * Cartoon Network's rights seem to have been terminated. The termination is mainly conjecture, since the contract isn't publicly known. While there are rumors that Cartoon Network violated the contract, these rumors have not been confirmed. * Due to the bankruptcy of The Game Factory, since it was a Danish company, it's unknown who owns any of the rights to Get Ready to Virtualize, Code Lyoko: Fall of X.A.N.A., or Quest for Infinity. * Because the company failed before its release, it's unknown who owns any of the rights to the Code Lyoko MMORPG. The developing company was South Korean, for reference. * It's unknown if Megamax still holds any of the broadcast rights for their respective markets. * Due to their shutdown of the Code Lyoko: Social Game, it is unknown if 3DDUO still has a valid license to develop and maintain the Code Lyoko: Social Game. Category:Code Lyoko Category:Code Lyoko Evolution Category:Moonscoop Category:Antefilms Category:Broadcasters Category:Company Category:Kabillion